If I cooked more at home, I'd be tempted to do this.

 

The above is the cover page from a web site of a firm that sells shares of butchered meat to the public.  This firm, Walden local meat, sells shares which they will have delivered to your home in the NYC area and in New England.

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I first got wind of this firm several years ago, when I received a post card describing their service.  During the pandemic, if I found myself driving to Hudson to go to the former Applestone Meat Company to get butchered meat, I'd have tried out a Walden subscription.  (There is no way I'd have driven to Boston to visit their shop.  Too bad they don't open a second in-person outlet in the NYC area.)  The prices are reasonable for high quality meats, but it might not pay for a person cooking for one to get a subscription.

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During the pandemic, many wholesalers such as Baldor decided to open their doors to the general public.  Many kept minimum order requirements to avoid loss generating transactions.  But it opened up the door for the public to get ingredients usually available only to restaurant chefs.  If the worst of the pandemic restrictions stayed with us preventing us from going shopping in person, I'd have ordered from these firms.  We were very lucky to get back to some "normalcy" within a short few months of quarantine. So I didn't have to change my ways that much.

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One day, I expect that I will try out Walden's services.  That will likely be when I've found someone with whom to settle down.  It'll be nice to eat something healthy again. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Would you have bought your meat from a vending machine?

 

Assuming you were a carnivore like me, would you eat meat that looks and tastes this good?  In my case, I did, and miss the option to buy it direct from the butcher.  Unfortunately, the Applestone meat company recently closed down all of its outlets - shortly after they opened their first Westchester county outlet in Eastchester, NY.

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When I was dating XGFJ, one of the places we'd pass in her neighborhood was the Applestone Meat Company outlet.  There were times that she wanted to buy a good steak (or roast), and didn't want to go to the local supermarket or drive into Kingston or to New Paltz.  I've eaten Applestone's meat, and was willing to drive to either of their first two storefronts during the early days of the pandemic.  (In those early days, no one knew how to be safe. So any place one could shop for food with minimal human contact was a blessing - especially when the meat was this good.)  Later on, I found out that they were opening an Eastchester store, but didn't have the chance to get there before this place closed down.

Years ago, many supermarkets butchered their meats on site.  In the past few years, it became cheaper to butcher meats elsewhere and deliver butchered, wrapped meat directly to stores.  (Some stores kept butchering tools in the stores, so that larger cuts of meat could be sliced down into manageable units for consumer use.)  If you were to go to a Walmart, Aldi or Trader Joe's, all you'd find are prepackaged meats - it's much cheaper and more hygienic to butcher the meats in a central location and deliver them to stores. 

In Japan, they sell almost everything in vending machines, including clothing.  In Germany, they have sausage vending machines (shown above).  So why shouldn't Americans take the next step and sell freshly butchered meat out of vending machines?

Applestone did so.  Sadly, it didn't work out for them.  Knowing what I know about their former product, the meat was expensive - but very good.  If I wanted to cook a true gourmet meal, and wasn't satisfied with the quality of meat from my local supermarket, I'd have gone to Applestone.  This is one shopping option that I'll miss, even though I hardly had the chance to use it.

 

PS: Would you have patronized the BAMN! Automat?.  What about the Brooklyn Dumpling Shop?

The other day, my telephone was like the switchboard at Grand Central Terminal

 

Recently, I had more people calling (or texting) me in one night than usually happens in a week. But then, it was perfectly understandable given the circumstances....

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Early in the day, my brother interrupted me while I was taking care of something important. He called me to let me know that a financial issue we've had closing out our dad's estate should be over soon - the bank is mailing out a check, and my brother will deposit it on arrival.  This means that, god willing, I should be able to afford to take my Hawaii cruise when cruising starts up again.  

Later in the day, Vicki called me to chat a little. I had just started to straighten out some of the mess in the apartment, and was interrupted.  A few seconds after Vicki hung up, my brother called again, just to shoot the breeze. I called my friend Vanessa to touch base on a course which required my help figuring out her problem with setting up an ad campaign on Google search, and she said that she'd call back shortly. So I took this time to chat with TCL. 

Once done with TCL, I received a message from a friend in Manhattan, and we "chatted" for a while before I was tired of texting.  So I bid her goodbye for the night. And almost immediately after wards, I received a text from a new acquaintance on Facebook, and we started to shoot the breeze.  Although she's talking with me as Mario, I know she'd be surprised to find out that I once frequented her store as Marian.  (That's something I will reveal at a future time.) While shooting the breeze, XGFJ texted me to chat a little.  She sent me a link for a store in her neck of the woods that opened a new location in Eastchester.  Applestone Meat is known for its 24x7 stores which use vending machines to dispense their products.  Although the meat is expensive, it is an excellent value if you like high quality beef.  By the time I was done with my new friend and my ex girlfriend, Vanessa called me back and we were both talking about her Google ad problems and catching up on what has been going on with our lives.

By the time midnight came along, I was fried.  This is one of those times I'm glad that I don't have to go to work in the morning.